What a wonderful world

"Excuse me sir, but I cannot allow you to enter the plane anymore. You are too late and the boarding gate is by now closed. I am sorry. You will have to wait another week for your next flight." Covered in sweat, I wake up. It is too damn hot in my room. I wonder what time it is. In the darkness, I search for my digital camera (besides my laptop, the only device with a clock I'm carrying). Found it. "6 AM. God it's too early!"

I am in Bangkok. I arrived yesterday from Denpasar. On my last night of travelings, neither did I want to sleep at the airport nor did I want to go to Khao San Road (the backpacker's district). Hence, I found myself a very nice hotel room in the city centre. In 6 hours, I fly back to Berlin.

I am anxious, nervous and terrified. Everything came to an end so fast. If there were moments where I thought "What I am doing here? I should be working. This is nonsense! Traveling for such a long period of time…" I now wish the 4th of October of 2010 to be today and not 8 months ago. 8 months! It is indeed quite a lot of time, isn't it?! And yet, I wish it could start all over again.

It is impossible to summarize everything I've lived. I won't even try to do it. It is past, isn't it? One of the things I learned in Thailand was "You should die to the past every second. Your life is now!" How can you do that? I have no fucking clue. I can't do it, but I am working on it.

Before "I die to this past", I want to tell you what you probably already know: The world is absolutely wonderful! No matter how gorgeous the country is, how impressive and beautiful, what really remains from it, down to the very core, is the "strangers" you will inevitably meet along the way. I have witnessed and experienced true kindness, friendship, love and hospitality from people with all sorts of backgrounds, races and beliefs. And this, this is something so powerful and overwhelming that makes you realize that 99% of the human beings are actually ready to give rather than take — and I was surely given so much!

I thank you all for "traveling with me" through your visits and supporting words.
I am looking forward to see you again soon.
Love, Ricardo.